Thoughts from home

Today is Abigail's 16 month birthday. She continues to explode in her verbal and physical development, constantly amazing and entertaining us. She says new words everyday, changing

so rapidly that it is hard to even keep up with it in a journal. Today she said "elmo" as we were reading one of her favorite books to her. The soft cloth covered book was her favorite to chew on and look at when she was younger. She's moved on to more substantial books like "Move Over Rover" (a prase which she also says) though she still loves the Eric Carle books like Brown Bear,

Brown Bear. I love that she will come and sit on my lap and lean up against me while I read her these favorites over and over.

April is almost done with her residency, her official end date coming in one week, Tuesday Sept. 2. This cannot come soon enough, as with both of us still working full time we haven't had the quality family time this year that we had hoped for- yet. I am convinced that it is coming. Thankfully we've had the help of great family and friends to get us through our babysitting needs over the last three weeks. Our friend Megan Stevens watched her today and put her hair in french braids! It was the first time that she's had her hair in braids and she looked absolutely beautiful! I hope to learn to braid her hair like that myself! After "night hawk" duty last night and sticking around for anesthesia this morning, I crashed in the call room for 5 hours or so. After coming home, I read to Abbi while April but together a fantasic dinner of baked chicken, roasted veggies, baked bread, and Riesling. It was so nice just to sit as a family and enjoy each other. I feel like I've been really out of the loop, having been on nights for the last week. I'm looking forward to curling up next to April for a decent nights sleep in just a few minutes.

Yesterday, John and I secured 160 pairs of sterile surgical gloves and a boatload of non sterile gloves for rick and jack- we look forward to sending these with meds, chocolate, and other goodies very soon. I've decided to try to get at least one pair of sterile gloves for each case to take with us. We will be in Zim for 5 months (roughly 150 days). At 4 cases a day, this winds up being 600 pairs of gloves. With each box of gloves holding 40 pairs, this is about 30 boxes of gloves for John and I. Wow. The glove logistics alone are already getting hairy.

The Banks, Epplerys, and us have talked a lot about getting a bible study going, which has been shamefully lacking to this point. Being out of touch with the Bible leaves me feeling like a man without water, dry and wanting. It also begs the question: what are you doing all of this for? Doing this apart from the firm foundation of Christ is asking for failure.

Tomorrow is a new day- I'm excited about seeing Abbi in the morning and about sleeping next to April. My girls, my treasure.